What is a memory?

What is a memory?

Augustine (one of my favorite theologian/philosophers) says,

A wonderful admiration surprises me, amazement seizes me on these thoughts. And men go abroad to admire the heights of mountains, the mighty waves of the sea, the broad tides of rivers, the compass of the ocean, and the circuits of the stars, yet pass over the mystery of themselves without a thought. They are not amazed that when I spoke of all these things, I did not see them with my eyes, yet could not have spoken of them unless, inwardly in my memory, I actually saw the mountains, billows, rivers, stars, which I had once seen —and that ocean of which I've heard—with the same vast spaces between as if I saw them abroad. Yet I did not draw these scenes into myself when I saw them; nor are they themselves here with me. I have their images only, and I know by what sense of the body each was impressed upon me.

Maybe a memory are those things (pictures, places, people, ideas, actions, etc.) which are impressed upon us and create within us a visceral (relating to deep inward feelings rather than to the intellect) experience.

So here's to some memories:

flowers from a meadow, a sand dollar from an empty beach, a pine cone from a hike...

an image that helps me remember.....JOY

arriving at an unknown motel at 1am in the morning for 30 bucks off the side of a remote highway...a dark, dirty, don't take your shoes off and sleep in your clothes type of place...didn't see the pool until the morning.

um. wow.

an image that helps me remember....FEAR

or that beautiful little girl....looking up at daddy in a way that says...."can you pick me up?"

an image that helps me remember....SATISFACTION

or last night....sitting with a friend on the beach, talking, hanging out, and watching a huge moon rise over the city.

an image that helps me remember...CONTENTMENT

So what's a memory? These are some of mine....

What's yours?